My first encounter with the brief :

I first thought to choose this brief because I wanted to strive for something different than what I’d done in the past in my artistic journey. I always enjoyed creating a story line when it came to anything creative, however the theme of symbolism and metaphor captured my interest because I want to broaden my way of approaching a certain theme surrounding just a few words when it comes to making art according to them.

The two sets of words I chose are:

. Congested/Togetherness/Loneliness

. Pride/Arrogance/Humility

The reason as to why I chose these two specifically was because as any artist in my opinion, a lot of the time create art which we do somehow relate to on a personal level. I continued my research by firstly looking at the words themselves separately and their meanings in the dictionary, to be completely clear on what I will want to further research, in order to put a clear act of symbolic/metaphorical approach to my art pieces. I also started to jot down any artists and photos which I saw online through the media, which inspired me in terms of the style I want to go for when creating art along with the colour pallets, compositions which I think would be most appropriate.

Turning the minds eye

Having the text I was given for this project, I really enjoyed the story of the heroine and the snake. To me this story represented bravery and adventure based around China and I was glad to have had the opportunity to explore this style of creating art because I’m very fond of books and reading, so being able to come out with something out of a simple text was very refreshing.

The first step was to of course analyse and re read the text a few times to grasp all of its context and to make sure I hadn’t missed any major details. During this process I was also aware of certain questions I asked myself such as: Who are the main characters? Are there any significant mentions of the atmosphere and descriptions of the environment the story takes place in? etc.

This then allowed me to experiment with a range of colours which I thought suited best such as greens and dark purples to reds to convey an outstanding atmosphere of the snake because it was being portrayed as  the villain and as the most captivating creature. I managed to experiment with diverse drawing styles such as : abstract, detailed realistic approach and more loose strokes with graphite sticks and pencils. I then proceeded to scan my drawings into a photocopier and printed them out using the different inks the copier had as well as going back and rescanning the same pictures in twice to achieve a layered effect shown below.

I really liked how the sketches came out of this experiment as they remind me of the printing process we had done in previous projects but also the sketches in different colours merging on top of one another give a distressed feel. If I were to explore this further I would have definitely tried to incorporate more of some of the other subject featured in the text, such as the heroine who kills the snake and the environment of the mountain described in the story.

Some of my favourite photos of ‘the walk’ I took:

For the ‘walk’ part of this project I tried concentrating on the photography that I enjoy taking which is mainly street and dark aesthetic close ups of mundane things. Although I kept conscious of a theme along side with it which I went for mostly green and dark grey tones which I think complimented the photos which I also took in the studio.

It was very enjoyable to play with the DSLR indoors as well as outdoors and the different patterns I was able to achieve with the slower shutter speed.

My thoughts:

During this studio workshop I really enjoyed having the opportunity to experiment with different ways to play around with light photography, as I find photography as a form of art itself to be very interesting and something I take as a hobby on a daily basis. Therefore seeing how I can create art forms using photography which isn’t just taking street photos or ones which include a certain aesthetic, it was refreshing to see the outcomes of a more abstract approach to this project.

This short trip to the library opened me up to multiple books which involved anatomy and the human form which is what inspired me further to stick with the theme I had chosen for previous projects.

Process:

For this final outcome I was inspired by the aspect of the feeling you get when you first meet someone and how you can be taken aback by their beauty, which is something that many might think as shallow at first but dismiss to realise that sometimes it’s a very important factor because what we perceive as “attractive” will naturally draw us in even if it’s once we get to know those people is when that beauty can grow or crumble, depending on the experience. But it’s the initial glance that does subconsciously make us take the decision to approach the person.

I used acrylic paint and a semi-realistic approach, with rough brush stroke technique to this pice instead of focusing too much on perfectionism like I would normally with a painting. I’m pleased on how it turned out because the tones make the face ‘dreamy-like’ which is exactly what I wanted to convey.

Although, if I were to do it again I’d try to make some of the facial features more proportionate, as at the moment it’s quite asymmetrical and being the artist who painted it, I can notice the slight mistakes which are a little off putting.

Collage :

I got inspired to do this piece after judging my experiences that I’ve had with people so far while living at university and experiencing the ‘uni life’ so far.

Gathering all the possible things together from a magazine that I actually was given at a uni-freshers event. Thus included partying, dancing with friends  but also feeling slightly watched and at times having to deal with loneliness and the imposter syndrome.

Overall, I enjoyed putting this composition together however I would have possibly added more text into this piece of work.

Practice 20 min sketches to warm up wrist :